{"id":231751,"date":"2026-01-07T05:30:11","date_gmt":"2026-01-07T05:30:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/231751\/"},"modified":"2026-01-07T05:30:11","modified_gmt":"2026-01-07T05:30:11","slug":"watch-humpback-whales-mug-a-whale-watching-boat-off-maui","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/231751\/","title":{"rendered":"Watch Humpback Whales ‘Mug’ a Whale Watching Boat Off Maui"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"humpback<\/p>\n

\u201cGimme all your money and that watch!\u201d\u00a0 \u00a0Photo: YouTube\/\/Screenshot<\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

Seeing a whale in real life is a wonderful thing. It can be a little unnerving \u2014 their size alone is enough to make you understand how fragile our little bodies really are \u2014 but they are one of nature\u2019s most amazing creatures. A family vacationing in Maui found that out firsthand when they were \u201cmugged\u201d by a pair of what were likely juvenile humpback whales<\/a> while they were on a whale-watching expedition.<\/p>\n

\u201cMugging,\u201d as it refers to whales<\/a>, is when a whale gets so close to a boat that the pilot can\u2019t safely drive away without possibly harming the whale.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat term \u2018mugging\u2019 is related to the approach limits and the inability to move your vessel when the whale approaches and is within 100 yards here in Hawaii,\u201d explained Pacific Whale Foundation\u2019s chief scientist to KHON2 News<\/a>. \u201cThey\u2019re holding the vessel hostage, in a sense, and so they\u2019re getting mugged.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Bunce family, who were vacationing in Maui from Idaho, have been on other whale watching excursions in the past, but this one took the cake.<\/p>\n

\u201cAm I in a dream?\u201d Kaiden Bunce asked himself when the whales appeared. \u201cIs this actually happening? Are these actual whales?\u201d<\/p>\n

The whole encounter only lasted about five minutes, but that would likely feel like a very long time when you\u2019re face-to-face with the largest creatures on the planet. The whales, who were just curious, popped up beside the boat and stayed there, exhaling great clouds onto the boat passengers and watching the cameras.<\/p>\n

It isn\u2019t an experience that\u2019s likely to happen again, but it is an experience that will keep the Bunce family coming back in hopes of a repeat.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cGimme all your money and that watch!\u201d\u00a0 \u00a0Photo: YouTube\/\/Screenshot Seeing a whale in real life is a wonderful…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":231752,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[96170,61,60,118473,82,118474,13702,263],"class_list":{"0":"post-231751","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wildlife","8":"tag-humpback-whales","9":"tag-ie","10":"tag-ireland","11":"tag-maui","12":"tag-science","13":"tag-whale-mugging","14":"tag-whale-watching","15":"tag-wildlife"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/231751","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=231751"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/231751\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/231752"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=231751"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=231751"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=231751"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}